Restorative Justice

Purpose of Justice:
Justice is a strong means to create order in a society, it is unfortunate that in the mind of many the concept of Justice in negative as we have often been used to the penal code of justice and if that is all a society has then there is a very strong reason for the negativity associated with Justice. Only a dictatorial punitive society would want such an image of community. Good and effective justice will create a society desiring to to what is right and living peacefully with each other, which is the main aim of true justice. This can only be achieved with a strong compassionate component to the Justice system. I call this Restorative Justice. This Justice was practiced in some form, though the details are hard to find, within the Biblical concept of “creating 6 cities of refuge” within the newly formed land for the Children of Israel under the leadership of Joshua.
An example of why restorative justice is needed: https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/driver-who-hit-home-and-away-star-and-her-family-on-boxing-day-was-a-serial-traffic-offender/news-story/792d5dba3a3a04d4e744e7765daa84aa?utm_source=Daily%20Telegraph&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial
Process to produce Restorative Justice.
- Laws need to be precise and subject to one interpretation and equally applicable to all.
- Penalties to breaches to the law code must be for the purpose of demonstrating that the offending behaviour is wrong and to the balanced with an incentive to correct behaviour.
- The legal process must seek to do two things: restore as far as possible what was damaged by the breach of the law and to correct the offending behaviour demonstrated by the breach of the law.
- The victim of any illegal act needs to be restored back to the original state before the offending event, as far as it is humanly possible.
- The perpetrator must admit to the offending event as being wrong, accept a process to correct behaviour, take appropriate action to restore that which was damaged by the offending event. As well as accepting a measured penalty for the offending event.
- A perpetrator of an illegal act not conceding the need to restore that which was damaged will not be able to re-enter society as a free person and may remain in a custodial situation indefinitely.